The Ballad of Davy Crockett

Background

Fess Parker, dressed in frontiersman clothing, sang the song on a log cabin set with musicians in similar attire. The repeated chorus of "Davy, Davy Crockett" runs through the track, which celebrates the man. The tune later featured in the Disneyland television miniseries Davy Crockett, which first aired on December 15, 1954, with the Mellomen providing the vocals. Parker portrayed Davy Crockett in that series and appeared in four additional episodes produced by Walt Disney Studios.

Buddy Ebsen played George "Georgie" Russel, and Jeff York took on the role of the famous boatman Mike Fink. Archie Bleyer, who headed Cadence Records, caught the song during the ABC broadcast on December 15, 1954, and contacted Bill Hayes that same night to see if he wanted to record it. The next day, Hayes sang while Al Caiola and Art Ryerson played guitar, and they cut the track in a single take at an RCA studio in Manhattan. Soon after, Fess Parker and Tennessee Ernie Ford released their own versions, with Ford's recorded on February 7, 1955.

All three made the Billboard charts in 1955: Hayes's version held the number 1 spot on the weekly chart from March 26 through April 23 and ranked number 7 for the year; Parker's reached number 6 on the weekly chart and number 31 for the year; Ford's peaked at number 4 on the weekly country chart and number 5 on the weekly pop chart, landing at number 37 for the year. A fourth version by bluegrass singer Mac Wiseman hit number 10 on radio charts in May 1955.

The song also topped the Cash Box chart from March 26 through May 14, 1955. A contemporary recording exists by the Sons of the Pioneers. Total sales exceeded ten million copies. Louis Armstrong recorded his own take in 1968.

In the United Kingdom, Hayes's version reached number 2 on the New Musical Express chart, Ford's hit number 3, and a version by British singer Max Bygraves peaked at number 20. Other UK artists such as Billy Cotton, Gary Miller, Ronnie Ronalde, and Dick James recorded the song in 1955 and 1956. The Western Writers of America named it one of the Top 100 Western songs of all time.

The Crockett craze

In 1955, Walt Disney Productions kicked off a big UK marketing push for the film Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier, which hit British theaters the following year, aiming to get the country's children "Crockett conscious." By then, the US was already deep in a "Crockett craze" thanks to the show's huge popularity. Mass-produced merchandise flooded the market, with fake coonskin caps becoming the most famous item. Schoolkids went wild for it, and the ballad crossed the Atlantic.

A French-language cover by Annie Cordy topped the French charts for five weeks in August 1956. That same year, Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver, running as the Democratic vice-presidential nominee, sported a Davy Crockett cap on the campaign trail. His ticket with Adlai Stevenson ultimately lost to incumbents Dwight D. Eisenhower and Richard Nixon. The craze pops up in the Molesworth book Back in the Jug Agane by Geoffrey Willans and Ronald Searle.

Decades later, the 1985 film Back to the Future, set mostly in 1955, features the Fess Parker version playing on a diner jukebox and a coonskin cap worn by one of Lorraine Baines' brothers. The song also appears in the Country Bear Jamboree, performed by Henry and Sammy. In the 2009 film Fantastic Mr. Fox, the title character tunes his belt radio to the Frontierland version as the movie opens.

Covers

Mac Wiseman, a member of the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame, put out a version on Dot Records in 1955 that climbed to number 10 on the country charts. That same year, Burl Ives released his own take on Decca. In France, Annie Cordy's French-language adaptation, "La Ballade de Davy Crockett," held the number 1 spot for five weeks in August 1956. Mary Wilson of The Supremes sang lead on a cover recorded for the group's shelved 1968 album Diana Ross & the Supremes Sing Disney Classics; the track later surfaced on the 1986 compilation The Never-Before-Released Masters.

The Kentucky Headhunters included a rendition on their 1991 album Electric Barnyard, which was issued as a single and peaked at number 49 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles chart. They Might Be Giants offered a modified version, retitled "The Ballad of Davy Crockett (in Outer Space)," on their 2009 album Here Comes Science.